Characterization of Organic Aerosol at a Rural Site in the North China Plain Region: Sources, Volatility and Organonitrates

• Published in: Advances in atmospheric sciences Vol. 38; no. 7; pp. 1115 - 1127
• Main Authors: Zhu, Qiao, Cao, Li-Ming, Tang, Meng-Xue, Huang, Xiao-Feng, Saikawa, Eri, He, Ling-Yan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Heidelberg Science Press 01.07.2021; Springer Nature B.V; Key Laboratory for Urban Habitat Environmental Science and Technology,Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School, Shenzhen 518055, China; Department of Environmental Sciences, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA%Key Laboratory for Urban Habitat Environmental Science and Technology,Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School, Shenzhen 518055, China%Department of Environmental Sciences, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA; Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA
• Subjects: Aerosols; Air pollution; Atmospheric Oxidation Capacity; Atmospheric Sciences; Biomass; Biomass burning; Black carbon; Burning; Carbon; Chemical composition; Control; Correlation analysis; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Formation Mechanisms; Geophysics/Geodesy; High resolution; Hydrocarbons; Mass; Mass spectrometry; Meteorology; Original Paper; Oxygen; Oxygenation; Ozone; PM2.5 Pollution: Quantification Methods; Resolution; Rural areas; Simulation; Urban areas; Volatility; China; 有机气溶胶; 华北平原; 挥发性; 有机硝酸酯; organic aerosols; 生物质燃烧; biomass burning; volatility; organonitrates; North China Plain
• ISSN: 0256-1530; 1861-9533
• DOI: 10.1007/s00376-020-0127-2

The North China Plain (NCP) is a region that experiences serious aerosol pollution. A number of studies have focused on aerosol pollution in urban areas in the NCP region; however, research on characterizing aerosols in rural NCP areas is comparatively limited. In this study, we deployed a TD-HR-AMS (thermodenuder high-resolution aerosol mass spectrometer) system at a rural site in the NCP region in summer 2013 to characterize the chemical compositions and volatility of submicron aerosols (PM 1 ). The average PM 1 mass concentration was 51.2 ± 48.0 µg m −3 and organic aerosol (OA) contributed most (35.4%) to PM 1 . Positive matrix factorization (PMF) analysis of OA measurements identified four OA factors, including hydrocarbon-like OA (HOA, accounting for 18.4%), biomass burning OA (BBOA, 29.4%), less-oxidized oxygenated OA (LO-OOA, 30.8%) and more-oxidized oxygenated OA (MO-OOA, 21.4%). The volatility sequence of the OA factors was HOA > BBOA > LO-OOA > MO-OOA, consistent with their oxygen-to-carbon (O:C) ratios. Additionally, the mean concentration of organonitrates (ON) was 1.48–3.39 µg m −3 , contributing 8.1%–19% of OA based on cross validation of two estimation methods with the high-resolution time-of-flight aerosol mass spectrometer (HR-ToF-AMS) measurement. Correlation analysis shows that ON were more correlated with BBOA and black carbon emitted from biomass burning but poorly correlated with LO-OOA. Also, volatility analysis for ON further confirmed that particulate ON formation might be closely associated with primary emissions in rural NCP areas.